Sum of Their Parts
by Meridian1
Summary: River loses herself in the stream and lets herself be a little of everything that everyone else is. Post BDM


**Title:** Sum of Their Parts  
**Author:** Meridian  
**Rating:** PG-13 (deals with death and violence)  
**Summary: **River loses herself in the stream and lets herself be a little of everything that everyone else is.  
**Warning:** Spoilers for _Serenity _(a.k.a. The Big Damn Movie) as it is set during the montage at the end of the film  
**Disclaimer:** Joss owns every last one of them, from characters to personified objects like _Serenity_�herself (See? Personification happening all around us!)  
**Author's Notes:** Written for Shanelle's Two Lines Fanfiction Challenge, this piece is dedicated to three extraordinary betas/critics-deepredbelle for her cheerful encouragement, darkling1 for his extensive edits, and ivy03 for her spot-on problem solving. All three of them did me a tremendous favor and put more effort into fixing the piece than I could have thought to ask for. So anything that leaps off the page as the suck? That's totally mine. Kudos to newredshoes for trying to sort out a title for me (hope you like what I went with!)  
**Feedback:** Yes, please.

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For the first time since being declared a reader_--phonetic similarity precedented upon limits of articulatory anatomical structure: ReaderRiverReaver--_River dances over the naked planes of mindscapes around her and there are no thorns of worry about what she might see. Mal expects she's doing this--_in the trenches, had to read how a man held his weapon to know if he'd be at your back--_and accepts. His are the first thoughts laid open to her, baldly left behind like errant toys in the cockpit.

She likes the flavors of his concern, the dual way he weighs each person--_hesitant scales for a premature Libra, zodiac child born of the early autumn, conception dated to mid-winter copulation, sex to offset winter depression--_taking their measure. Despite his narrow perception, this is as near to her experience as any could come_--sees through to the heart, friction only comes from the outside--_Whenever their balance slides, he shouts or needles until it is restored, and she resumes watching the others, watching Mal watch them, too.

He's glad of Zoe being functional and back to the way they were when they met, but he misses the Zoe-that-was-with-Wash because, improbably, she was the one he liked best--_heart exploded, imploded, pierced, crushed to powder, a broken thing that walks and makes it worse, won't sit, won't lie, lying leads to laying, and there's no laying without a partner_--but she can't be that way yet. Zoe heals by picking at scabs--_can't remember it was ever a wound if it sets without a scar--_and Mal only hopes she knows when to stop before it's bloody. In Zoe's eyes _all_ is blood-_cries through another's lids, transference unto those willing to break, already broken-_and the veterans unconsciously agree to avoid the subject of empty spaces, sharp objects, and casualties of war.

Thinking on Zoe and her loss puts him on the matter of Inara and the unsettled nature of their way, the possibility they might be no more together than ever they were_--the only confusion is the woman deals straight, but her lies reveal her truths, the ones she won't surrender--_and that he might never see her look at him for real the way she pretended to on that WAVE.Might be it's better for her to leave, and he prepares for it--_ain't got much left to lose from the center--_so he can not hate her when she does.

But River feels things he won't allow, he can't admit_--dreams the day he'll be able to afford her, and she knows it isn't money he needs--_because the others are as unguarded as he. Inara dopes his food to keep him in bed the first week--_tear the stitches, unravel the thread, spill him out onto, not into, wrongful death--_and he only forgives when he sees her rinse _Serenity_ clean of the Reaver paint. Because of the elegance in all that she does, he notices only the finery and the apology--_forgotten the ways of painting meaning onto a lover's skin, calligraphy of the soul, passion of the pen--_

There is a line, however; she cannot tell truths that aren't hers any more, unless they're _really_ secret, and not simply the kind that the crew wear just beneath their skin and the others pretend not to see_--tired--hungry--desperate--lustful--lonely--ache upon ache--_Those are not for her. They lead to trouble, and trouble has been put to a sleeping death--_statistically improbable that the fight is ended without proof and consecration, for missing persons are often pillars of new faiths_--and there are ample diversions among the present to keep spent thoughts hid in the past.

Simon is annoyed that she spies on him and Kaylee, mostly because she likes to tattle and get them in trouble with Mal_--always such a brat, so hard to be proud of her, but _is _proud and never afraid, only one never to be afraid--_though he is glad of her presence when he takes Wash out of the cockpit with Jayne's help. Jayne is comfortable with the dead he's killed, Simon is used to bodies, but neither can detach themselves from the leavings of a former friend. Simon goes to Kaylee after--_smothers under her kisses, sinks into her hammock, hangs by her magnetic mercy_--and Jayne sets to drinking--_seen the wreck; weren't any other in the 'verse coulda landed her 'sides the little man--_and she borrows a bit from each of their comforts. That night she spends hot and dizzy.

Kaylee takes to teaching her how to rewire the bits and pieces she can't get at all on her own, not if she wants to keep to the schedule the captain has set her--Serenity_ understands frustrations; Serenity wants to fly through the Black and she wants to hump Simon into the deck plates--_and River makes herself a smart assistant. No words, no lectures--_brain is circuitry and connecting currents, which well the River comprehends--_so long as she's careful not to pry too far--_debts Simon has and intentions to collect upon them; dreams of interest accrued, reaped, spent--_or linger too long--_tearful salt deficiency complicates water imbalance, links to reduced ovum viability--_because she is red-eyed enough as is.

Jayne pays her no mind, sets himself to work that Kaylee or the Captain can't finish. Grumbles less, does more work than the others because it was only his shoulder barking about with pain--_walked away from a Reaver pile up a near-whole man, something like a silver lining on a dung hill--_and he is glad he signed with this crew although he doesn't say it. He's sure they'll make five times as much, being such a fearless bunch by reputation--_should be proud of what they done, don't mean he stands on ceremony--_which is the only kind of invisible coin he likes.He sics chores on her sometimes, mostly helping Simon stockpile supplies raided from Mr. Universe's complex, and never hesitates to give her a weapon_--doesn't have to be sharp, the shallow wound disorients and distracts--_or something that could be used as one. Cleaned up the Reaver blades for her though it gave him shivers_--'cause they ain't right, but she's as far from right as they come in the Black, and if it comes to it, it's the scope at a hundred yards, can't nobody run that fast--_and told her to keep them out of Zoe's sight. She threw them out, smashed to pieces, because to touch them again is to become them, and Mal trusts she is a person.

More than that, she is River flowing, slicing through the sieves in others, finding her call and their need--

_-rear stabilizer's been riding low since testing yesterday, might do for a look-_

-_two hundred milligrams ryloidin will counter the sedative effects of painkillers without nausea_-

-_ain't I got shot up, too? Don't see me nightmaring or rutting next t'others trying to sleep_-

-_blue curtain with brown trim for the bed, the one on top of the case Mal found-_

_-smell of him ain't gonna last forever, breathe it in while I can-_

_-as long as we keep flying-_

--and answering to both, "Yes."

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Challenge Lyrics Prompt:

_cause in my head there's a greyhound station  
where i send my thoughts to far off destinations _

_ -death cab for cutie, soul meets body_


End file.
